A Spoonful of Sugar
by Cmdr's Monkey
Summary: Holmes refuses to take his medicine.


_I blame FoggyKnight for this._

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**A Spoonful of Sugar**

"Ah-choo!" sniffed my long-time friend, Mister Sherlock Holmes, as he sat in his armchair before the fireplace wrapped in an afghan rug and looking as miserable as he sounded. I had wanted him to rest in his bed and fight the flu from there but after nearly two weeks of suffering and laying in bed, Holmes had threatened to go back out into the cold weather again if I did not at least let him out into the sitting room.

"You should take the cough syrup, Holmes," said I from nearby.

"Never!" said he irritably. I knew he did not like the foul stuff, but he needed to take it or he would suffer through the night again.

"Come on, Holmes, it's not all that bad," I tried to persuade him but he simply shook his head.

"Perhaps a spoonful of sugar will help the medicine go down?" our temporary housekeeper said from the door of our sitting room (Missus Hudson was taking an impromptu sick holiday to the countryside), startling both of us at her sudden appearance. Holmes looked up at her and narrowed his eyes. She returned his look with a calm and patient one of her own as if she often had to deal with stubborn and unruly children. I had to credit her with her bravery to try and stand up to my irritable friend.

"What nonsense is that?" Holmes exclaimed from his armchair and then quietly followed her with his gaze. She walked into the sitting room and held out a hand to me for the bottle of cough syrup and the spoon before walking over to the table where our tea tray still rested from this afternoon.

"Surely you remember, Mister Holmes, that in every job that must be done, there is an element of fun," she started to say in an almost sing-song voice. My friend stared at her in aghast as she approached him with the cough syrup and the spoonful of sugar. "Now every task you undertake becomes a piece of cake, a lark! Aspree! It's very clear to me...

"That a spoonful of sugar helps the medicine go down, the medicine go down-wown, the medicine go down! Just a spoonful of sugar helps the medicine go down in a most delightful way! Do you not agree?"

"Oh good Lord... not you," said he with a groan and she gave him an impish grin.

"Now be a good boy and take your medicine, Mister Holmes." I could not help but laugh out loud as I watched in amazement when she managed to actually get him to willingly take the medicine and the sugar. Holmes coughed and sputtered on it in a defiant show that her idea didn't work even though I knew it had and the woman merely smiled and placed her hands on her hip before nodding in approval at him.

"Bah! Begone with you, beastly woman!" he exclaimed a moment later when I had finished laughing and he further buried himself in his blanket indignantly. It was obvious he did not like the fact that our housekeeper managed to get the medicine down him with little effort on her part.

She simply smiled at him and patted his shoulder before returning the medicine bottle and spoon to me. "Still the same little boy," she commented to me wistfully and I gave her a curious look, a look which she merely winked in reply before taking up the tea tray and walking back out with a promise of more tea.

"Missus Hopkins, my arse," Holmes muttered after she was gone. "I bet she still has that old carpet bag too."

"What, the white-flowered and red one?" I asked, puzzled over how Holmes could know this woman when he had been a boy. She was too young, younger than both of us in fact, to have been her housekeeper or governess.

"That be the one!" he exclaimed and looked up at me as I came over to join him in my armchair. "I still puzzle over how she did it though."

"Did what?"

"Stick an entire coat-rack into it, of course!" said he as if it was the most obvious thing in the world. "Surely you've seen the blasted thing in Missus Hudson's spare bedroom? A coat-rack we've never owned which mysteriously appears shortly after she arrives?"

"I would not know. I do not make it my business to enter somebody else's bedroom unlike you, Holmes," answered I.

"Bah! Then when she leaves, you need to watch her pack. Then you will understand." He eyed me with a determined stare and easily conveying that it was a task I must do in the future. The door to our sitting room opened just then and our hired housekeeper returned with another tray of tea and crumpets. Holmes eyed her carefully and I watched as she continued to smile and simply ignore his stares and the rude noises he was making.

As she started to leave, she regarded Holmes with a gentle smile and answered my friend's curiosity about her carpet bag as if she had been there for the entire conversation, "It is magic, Master Sherlock."

Then she was gone from our sitting room, leaving us with our mouths agape, and humming a catchy tune as she left. A tune that my friend could not help but mutter at her retreating back, it's catchy phrase:

"... even the sound of it is something quite atrocious."

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_Guess who? *goes off to hum* Um diddle diddle diddle um diddle ay! __Super-califragi-listicexpi-alidocious!_

_*kicks ffn for making her split the word*  
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End file.
